The Fergus Truck Show has come and gone for another year and it’s great to see that despite some early worries about the show’s future, the event went off without a hitch.

You may recall earlier this year, there was concern about whether the show would be able to continue at its current location. Some landowners were apparently feeling less than hospitable towards showgoers after their land suffered damage from previous events.

However, aside from a slightly different layout, this year’s Fergus Truck Show had a familiar look and feel.

As always, one of the highlights of the show for me was taking part in the Truck News Owner/Operator of the Year award presentation.

Sponsored by Freightliner, Goodyear and Castrol (with supporting sponsors Natural Resources Canada and OBAC also pitching in), the award was presented on the main stage July 24 right before Trooper took to the stage.

The Fergus Truck Show is the perfect venue to give away this award: it’s only right that Canada’s owner/ operator award is presented at Canada’s owner/operator show.

But it does provide some added challenges when the winner comes from outside Ontario, as was the case this year. Michael ‘Motor’ Rosenau of Calgary was this year’s winner and since he and his wife Dana were flying in the day of the presentation, we nervously anticipated a phone call that there had been a delay along the way.

Fortunately, the good folks at WestJet got them to Toronto on schedule and they pulled into the show just on time for the presentation. Accompanying Motor and his wife Dana were his parents Len and Jen as well as his aunt Val and uncle Gord. I knew our winner came from a trucking family, but to see this level of support was very impressive.

You can read more about Motor in this month’s issue and you can also watch an interview with him in the Aug. 5 episode of Transportation Matters at Trucknews.com.I watched the interview from underneath the Truck News tent as we all took shelter from the rain (okay, maybe I was hiding from the snake at the NAL booth that Kathy insisted I go pet), and was impressed by Motor’s thoughtful responses.

It would’ve been great to spend some more time with Motor and his family, but unfortunately as Trooper would say they were ‘here for a good time, not a long time.’ So we made sure to have an extra good time on Friday night and on Sunday morning we said our goodbyes. Congratulations go out to Motor. You’re a deserving winner and you have the support of a great family! •

-Rob Wilkins is the publisher of Truck News and he can be reached at 416-510-5123.